Greco’s shrink. No way did he want to talk to her. No way did he want to call her back, either.
“Yeah?” He hoped his hoarse clipped voice would indicate his displeasure at being called so early.
“Is this Jim Vega?”
If she’d listened to his voice mail properly, she’d have realized that he identified himself as “Jimmy.” How could she help him if she couldn’t even get his name right?
“This is Jimmy Vega.”
“This is Ellen Cantor. You called me yesterday?”
“Yeah.” Vega searched for his manners. Why was he being so hostile?
He knew why. One word: Wendy. His ex-wife. He could never look at any kind of counselor and not think of her. The therapy queen. The woman who believed talking things out could solve all your problems—and then promptly cheated on him and left with nary a session of marital counseling. They’d been divorced almost six years now. She was long remarried. Joy was grown. Those twin rug rats that Alan had impregnated her with while she and Vega were still together were in kindergarten now. It was time to stop hating her for how she’d hurt him. But for some reason, the wound never closed. His psyche felt like a minefield that poor Ellen Cantor was glibly planning a picnic on.
“Thanks for calling me back,” said Vega finally. “I, uh—don’t know if you know who I am.”
“You’re the police officer who was involved in that shooting incident.”
Involved-in-that-shooting-incident. That was kind. Better than he’d have said.
“I’ve been—sort of—ordered—by my job to get some counseling before I return to work and uh, a friend gave me your name.”
“When would you like to meet?”
“I don’t know,” said Vega. How about never? Is never good for you? “Next week? The week after?”
“I’ve been following the news. I think we should meet sooner than next week. Are you free today?”
“Today? On a Sunday?”
“Unless your religion precludes it.”
Does football count?
“I’m pretty booked all week otherwise,” said Cantor. “I don’t normally do appointments on a Sunday. But I’m happy to put the time aside for a patient who really needs it.”
Co?o! She thought he was a head case. He hesitated.
“Let me guess,” said Cantor. “You would rather have a colonoscopy than visit a psychiatrist.”
Vega laughed. “Yeah. I guess I would. Okay. How about ten A.M.?
“That would be fine.” She gave him an address in Wickford. He was hoping not to have to go back to Wickford so soon.
“Is that an office?”
“My house. I have a private office entrance. Sort of like some dentists.”
“I’d rather have root canal.”
Vega hadn’t been back to Wickford since the shooting. He told himself it was just a place. No big deal. He texted his lawyer and Joy to let both of them know he was seeing a shrink like they’d wanted. He hoped this might make up for his behavior with Joy last night. He didn’t hear back.
Wickford was almost an hour south of his house. He managed the first part of the drive just fine. He felt calm and reasonably collected on the highway. The sky was a hard shell of blue and pierced with a bright morning sun that promised to fade quickly under December’s heavy baggage of night. Vega kept his mind blank by alternating his music CDs with sports talk on the radio.
But as soon as he made the turnoff to Wickford, everything changed. A headache throbbed at the back of his head. His neck felt like someone had tried to dislocate it from his shoulders. His fingers developed pins and needles. He flexed and unflexed his hands at the steering wheel as he navigated the winding roads and backcountry horse farms. He relied on his GPS to get him to Ellen Cantor’s place and damned if it didn’t take him in practically the same direction as Ricardo Luis’s house.
You’re behaving like an idiot, he told himself. You’re acting like some traumatized kid—like Marcela’s daughter at the hospital last night. That poor girl had had no hand in the cards she’d been dealt. But Vega? His misery was of his own making.
Calm down. Control your breathing. He was sweating profusely. The trees, the stone walls, the white clapboard houses—all of it filled him with dread. He rolled down his windows and gulped in air that had the same bite of wood smoke mixed with decaying leaves that he’d smelled Friday night.
The scent took him back, hard and fast. His mouth went dry. His stomach tightened. He tried to think about anything except how much he wanted to puke up the bagel he’d grabbed on his way out. He drove past the road where all the cop cars had been parked on the night of the shooting. Just seeing the bent signpost where yellow crime scene tape still fluttered made his whole body shake.